Integrated circuits process electrical signals to produce rich electronic applications. In signal processing applications where wide bandwidth, low power consumption, and low voltage operation are simultaneously required, current-mode circuits have an advantage over voltage-mode circuits, especially due to the fact that the inherent parasitic capacitances present in the circuit do not have to be charged/discharged with large voltage swings.
In the context of current-mode circuits, current amplifiers are important building blocks. Current amplifiers can amplify an input current signal such that an amplified current output can be used in another part of the circuit. Current amplifiers can serve as adjoint elements to voltage amplifiers, and making possible important circuit transformations between voltage and current domains, although they can also be found in predominantly voltage-mode applications. Designing current amplifiers is not trivial, since a designer faces many constraints such as efficiency, cost, achievable gain, and bandwidth. In cases where lower cost and ease of or ability to integrate with modern digital circuitry are required, Complementary metal-oxide-semiconductor (CMOS) current amplifiers are preferred over bipolar implementations.